


It's a strange way of saying that I know I'm supposed to love you

by diner_drama



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Bucky doesn't understand boundaries, Bucky loves science fiction, M/M, Not Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Compliant, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Sam just wants to bake in peace
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-09
Updated: 2020-03-27
Packaged: 2020-11-28 09:34:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20964347
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/diner_drama/pseuds/diner_drama
Summary: It's about three weeks after Steve wakes up on the bank of the Potomac when he realizes he's being followed. He sees flashes of metal in the corner of his eye, a dark shadow that scurries away when he turns his head, but it's not until he notices things moved in his apartment that he figures out who it is.Steve lives alone, so it's been a long time since he's woken up from a nap on the couch to find a glass of water waiting for him on the table and a blanket draped over him. Seventy-odd years, in fact.Once he knows what's going on, he keeps an eye out for pencils that weren't where he left them, glasses put away in cupboards, thumbprints on his sketchbooks. It's like having an affectionate poltergeist.Sam's having the same problem, a shadowy presence just out of sight everywhere he goes. One day he's walking in the park and a bush starts whispering to him, telling him to stop using dark chocolate chips in his cookies because Steve prefers milk."This is not OK," says Sam when he recounts this story in the Avengers tower later that evening to his assembled superhero friends. "I do not need baking advice from the ghost of Edward Scissorhands."





	1. Chapter 1

It's about three weeks after Steve wakes up on the bank of the Potomac when he realizes he's being followed. He sees flashes of metal in the corner of his eye, a dark shadow that scurries away when he turns his head, but it's not until he notices things moved in his apartment that he figures out who it is.

Steve lives alone, so it's been a long time since he's woken up from a nap on the couch to find a glass of water waiting for him on the table and a blanket draped over him. Seventy-odd years, in fact.

Once he knows what's going on, he keeps an eye out for pencils that weren't where he left them, glasses put away in cupboards, thumbprints on his sketchbooks. It's like having an affectionate poltergeist. 

Sam's having the same problem, a shadowy presence just out of sight everywhere he goes. One day he's walking in the park and a bush starts whispering to him, telling him to stop using dark chocolate chips in his cookies because Steve prefers milk.

"This is not OK," says Sam when he recounts this story in the Avengers tower later that evening to his assembled superhero friends. "I do not need baking advice from the ghost of Edward Scissorhands."

"He's just... trying to look out for me," says Steve with his patented aw-shucks embarrassment. 

"He's just trying to _raise_ my _blood pressure_," mutters Sam with narrowed eyes.

"He watered my plants for me and fixed my dripping tap," says Steve helplessly. "I don't think he's _dangerous_."

Tony snorts through a mouthful of cinnamon-raisin bagel. "We know he's dangerous, El Capitan."

Sam nods. "Dude's a crack shot, with a million knives and a murder strut to match."

Steve burrows deeper into his chair. "I like the way he walks," he mumbles, blushing a deep crimson red.

"Never mind Steve's... whatever _that_ was," sighs Sam, "how do we find the guy?"

"If he's popping up this often he must be staying someplace in the city," suggests Steve. "He's fast, but he can't be traveling in and out of town just to shadow us."

"Ten points to Hufflepuff," says Tony, pointing his bagel in Steve's general direction.

"I'm a Ravenclaw," says Steve, a little affronted.

"OK, first of all," starts Sam, "I saw you jump out of a helicopter without a parachute like three days ago so _why_ you don't think you're a Gryffindor is beyond me, but most importantly can we _not_ talk about Harry Potter when we need to deal with the supersoldier assassin giving me _cooking tips_?"

"The creative process is a mysterious thing, my fine feathered friend," says Tony. "Jarvis, do we have any cameras on Steve's place?"

"Not any more," says Steve. "I came home one day and there was a pile of crumpled metal and wires on my table. I think he found every bug and camera that you and S.H.I.E.L.D. ever put in my house."

"He might have left some of his own, though. Jarvis, do a sweep of transmissions coming from Steve's place."

"There are eight camera feeds presently being transmitted from Captain Rogers' apartment," say Jarvis' clipped tones from the ceiling.

"Alright, see if you can decrypt the streams and trace where they're headed. They probably won't lead us straight to him, but we might be able to hijack the feeds and see him the next time he murder struts into your apartment."

"In the meantime, you should let me look around your place," murmurs Natasha, looking way more sympathetic than anyone else in the room. "See if I can get any clues about what he's up to."

Reluctantly, Steve nods his assent. If it has to be anyone, at least Natasha will be discreet.

* * *

Discreet she may be, but delicate she is not. Half an hour into her rummaging through his apartment and Steve is ready to sink through the floor and _die_.

"Why did you buy this shirt?" she asks, holding up his favorite soft tartan flannel. "Are you moonlighting as a lumberjack?"

"It's snuggly," he says, defensive. 

"Why do you only have three button-up shirts? You do realize you can afford clothes now, right?"

"I have four button-up shirts."

Natasha looks up, whip-sharp. "There's only three here and there's none in your laundry. What's missing?"

"The blue one," he says softly, eyes a little misty with memory. "Bucky always said blue brings out my eyes."

"I guess we should be thankful he's not stealing your underwear," she says, replacing the shirts and rifling through his nightstand.

"You think he took it?"

She sighs. "I do, Steve, but that doesn't mean he's his old self again. For all we know, he's training sniffer dogs with it."

"If he wanted to hurt me he would have had plenty of opportunities already."

"We don't know what he's planning," she says as she pulls out a stack of old photographs from the drawer. She lingers over a strip of black-and-white stills from a photo booth, three photos with one ripped off from the end. "Was this always missing one?"

"No." Steve takes them from her, a sad smile on his face as he looked at Bucky's grinning face pressed up against his. "These are from the World's Fair. Bucky thought that booth was the best thing he'd ever seen. He made us go in three times. This is the only copy I could find after I woke up. The last one was..." He swallows, uncomfortable. "It was kinda personal."

"You were kissing?" she asks softly. 

He nods, a lump in his throat.

"We're gonna find him, Steve," she says, gripping his arm in a way that is both painful and reassuring. "I don't know what kinda state he'll be in, but I promise you we'll find him."

* * *

In the end, it's Steve who finds him. One restless night he decides to climb up onto the roof of his apartment building and paint the skyline, just to keep his mind off things. That's when he sees a shadow creeping from his window onto the street below and making a beeline across town towards a familiar corner shop.

The next day he stakes out the place and waits for Bucky to leave before he slips in himself. Many years ago, they used to sit at the counter here and share a malt, but now the place is boarded up and derelict, the paint flaking on the old sign and the walls crumbling around him. It breaks his heart to see the sad little mattress in the corner, a book opened face-down on the pillow just like Bucky used to do with his library books, the spine be damned. There's a stack of second-hand novels near the makeshift bed - a mixture of pulp sci fi and childhood classics, Tom Sawyer alongside a busted-up paperback with a busty alien wench on the cover.

He sits down heavily on the thin mattress, punched in the chest by the sheer feeling of relief at this tangible evidence that Bucky, his Bucky, was within arm's reach. He's still struck sometimes by sudden thoughts that he longs to share with the only other person who would understand - the betrayal of the Dodgers, the way that bananas all taste wrong nowadays, just dumb things. More than anything else, he misses the glances they'd share when someone else was being an asshole, the way they could communicate a world of comedy with only the quirk of an eyebrow.

He runs his hand over the thin blanket and uncovers his old, blue shirt, wrapped around the sheets as though Bucky had been sleeping with it in his arms. He flicks through the book, an ancient hardback with yellowing pages and a crumbling binding. He flips to the front page and reads the title: _A Little Princess_.

That's when Steve gets an idea.

* * *

He starts with books, because they seem the least invasive. He takes his well-thumbed copy of _The Hobbit_ and waits for the right moment, before slipping into the shop through a window and leaving it on the mattress. A week later it's returned to him, left on his coffee table while he slept, pages folded willy-nilly and covered in coffee stains in a way that is intimately and maddeningly familiar.

A little bolder, _The Velveteen Rabbit_ is next, placed on top of a thick, warm new blanket for Bucky's bed.

The book comes back this time with a blank page ripped from one of Steve's sketchbooks with "SOMETHING MODERN" scrawled in a clumsy, shaky hand in charcoal tucked inside it.

Steve all but rolls his eyes, because only Bucky could respond to this kind of slow, hesitant process of familiarization by being a brat about the choice in literature. Nonetheless, he picks up his five-book set of _The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy_ and a big box of popping candy and wraps them up in a new set of high-threadcount sheets.

That night, he wakes up to a pair of narrowed blue eyes staring right through him in the dark.

"Your candy was defective," says Bucky. "It exploded."

"It's supposed to," says Steve, muddled and hazy with sleep. "S'fun."

Cautiously, not dropping his gaze, Bucky pulls a packet of candy from one of his pockets and tips a little of it into his mouth. Steve can hear the popping sound from across the room as Bucky's face goes through an indescribable series of emotions.

"Okay," he says eventually, and swings a leg out of the window. "Go back to sleep."

* * *

Peggy Carter's mind may not work the way it used to, but she still can and will destroy you at a game of chess without even blinking.

"Steve, darling," she says, her wide brown eyes regarding him reproachfully as he gazes off into the middle distance. "Are you quite with me today? It usually takes you slightly longer to lose."

"Sorry," he says, scratching the back of his neck self-consciously. "I just... I was thinking about Bucky."

Peggy softens. "He was a lovely boy," she says, patting his hand. "I know you loved him a great deal." She leans close, conspiratorial. "I had a brother in the theater, you know," she whispers. 

"Peggy," chokes Steve, turning beetroot red.

"Now set the board back up and let's try that again. Your latent homosexuality is hardly an excuse for such shoddy work."


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One day when Steve gets home from the gym, he finds Bucky crouched in a corner with clear views to all the exits, surrounded by protein bar wrappers, reading _Guards! Guards!_.
> 
> "You have no real food in your house," grunts Bucky by way of a greeting.
> 
> "I usually order in," says Steve absently, struck with how nice it is to see Bucky in his home, where he belongs. "You want pizza?"
> 
> Bucky gives him his patented I-grew-up-in-Brooklyn-punk-are-you-kidding-me look. "That even a question?"

On his next visit to Bucky's, Steve brings some DIY supplies and stops up the holes in the walls to keep away the winter chill. He leaves some clothes on the bed, warm sweatpants, thick socks, cozy flannel shirts, and a woolen sweater that Steve's been wearing for a couple of days, that smells like him.

Maybe Steve can't wrap Bucky up in his arms right now, but at least he can keep him warm and reassured from a distance.

* * *

Steve's making coffee one morning when the hair on the back of his neck stands up.

"Hey, Buck," he says gently, turning around and keeping his hands in full view, like he's dealing with a skittish wild animal. 

Bucky is crouching on his windowsill, watching him steadily. He's wearing the sweater.

"Do you want a coffee?"

Steve takes Bucky's responding grunt as assent and pours him a cup, stirring in a couple of spoonfuls of sugar out of decades-old habit. Slowly, he crosses the room and hands him the coffee. Bucky takes the mug in both hands and lowers himself gracefully onto the sill. They sit in comfortable, cautious silence for a few moments, enjoying their hot beverages.

"How've you been, Buck?" asks Steve tentatively after a while, torn between needing to be wary and wanting to throw his arms around Bucky, to envelop him like a sweater and never let go.

"Good," he says, his voice gruff. "Been reading."

"Yeah?"

Bucky gives a crooked half-smile. "Yeah. I liked the space ones you gave me. Funny."

"I thought of you when I read them for the first time," Steve chuckles. "Like all those magazines you used to get."

The half-smile grows, getting warmer. "I remember." He finishes his coffee and stands up, ready to leave. "I could... Another funny one?"

"Sure, Buck," says Steve, leaning over to pluck a couple of volumes from the bookshelf. "Terry Pratchett next. You'll like him."

Bucky doesn't say goodbye but he does give a little salute before he climbs back out into the night.

"Mind how you go, Buck," says Steve to the empty window.

* * *

A few nights later he wakes up with Bucky sitting on the edge of his bed and frowning intensely.

"S'wrong?" asks Steve, flicking on the bedside light.

"We used to be in love," says Bucky, as though he were accusing Steve of murder.

"Yeah, we did," Steve says gently, a little flicker of hope kindling inside his chest. "You remember that, too?"

Bucky shakes his head. "Bits," he mumbles. "Feelings. Little flashes here and there. It wasn't in the books I read about you."

Steve gives a sad smile. "Nobody knew but us. It wasn't the kind of thing you could talk about back then."

Bucky nods, accepting his explanation, then lunges forwards to kiss Steve on the lips, dry and rough and hesitant. He nods again, as though he's confirmed his suspicions, and vanishes out the window again. On the bed, he leaves behind Steve's copy of _Good Omens_. 

Steve, fond, sleepy and a little confused, goes back to sleep.

* * *

With uncharacteristic patience, Tony waits until the next Semi-Compulsory Avengers Movie Night to corner Steve.

"I haven't heard much from you about your old supersoldier friend, Capsicle, so imagine my surprise when Jarvis manages to decrypt the video feed and I see you cozying up with him _in your bed_."

"It's none of your business, Tony."

"It's none of my business that there's a super assassin creeping around and whispering sweet nothings to one of my _best friends_?"

"I'm one of your best friends?" If he weren't so annoyed, Steve would almost be touched.

"Don't change the subject," says Tony flatly. "Why didn't you tell us?"

"Just let me handle it. Once he's a bit more himself I'll bring him over for you to meet him."

"The guy's single-handedly carried out more assassinations than anyone else in history and you're running some kind of _midnight book club_ with the guy, Steve-o. Forgive me if I don't trust your judgment on this."

Steve shrugs. "As far as I can tell, you don't have any option other than to trust my judgment. Pass me the popcorn and let's watch the movie."

* * *

One day when Steve gets home from the gym, he finds Bucky crouched in a corner with clear views to all the exits, surrounded by protein bar wrappers, reading _Guards! Guards!_.

"You have no real food in your house," grunts Bucky by way of a greeting.

"I usually order in," says Steve absently, struck with how nice it is to see Bucky in his home, where he belongs. "You want pizza?"

Bucky gives him his patented I-grew-up-in-Brooklyn-punk-are-you-kidding-me look. "That even a question?"

They eat their pizzas sitting sprawled over the floor, chatting sometimes but mostly in silence as Bucky reads his book and Steve sketches him. Once he's finished eating, Bucky stands to leave.

"You wanna stay over?" offers Steve. "We can put the couch cushions on the floor."

"Like when we were kids," chuckles Bucky. He smiles, a sad little quirk of the lips. "Soon, OK?"

"OK, Buck."

* * *

In the end, Bucky doesn't ask to stay overnight like a normal person - Steve wakes up a few nights later with 200 pounds of grubby super-soldier clamped to his back like an octopus.

Steve blinks awake slowly and rolls over to look into Bucky's baby blues.

"Hi."

"Is this OK?" asks Bucky in a low, rough voice.

"This is perfect," Steve murmurs, and rolls over, pulling Bucky's arms more firmly around him and going back to sleep.

When the morning sun filtering through the curtains wakes Steve, Bucky isn't there, but Steve wasn't really expecting him to be. A cursory glance around his apartment shows that he's missing a t-shirt and a couple of books, and some more of his Terry Pratchetts have been returned.

* * *

Bucky gets more talkative over the next few weeks, his voice losing the gruffness of underuse and sounding more like his old self. Steve has slowly but surely replaced Bucky's wardrobe of tactical gear with comfortable, practical clothing that he just happens to look absolutely adorable in. He hesitantly shares his snippets of memory with Steve, checking that the things he remembered were real and getting him to fill in the gaps. They kiss, more, and sometimes Bucky ends up in his bed in the middle of the night, just to cuddle. Steve still notices things moved around his apartment when he's not there, so he knows that Bucky's still looking out for him, in his own way.

The subject of meeting the rest of the Avengers has come up a few times, but Bucky's shied away from committing to a particular day, saying vaguely that he'd like to be a bit more human before he has to meet the family.

"I'm not the same any more, Stevie," he says gently. "It might take a while."

"Don't give up on yourself."

"Please," he laughs, his old charming twinkle in his eye, "I gave up on myself twice before breakfast this morning."

"Third time's the charm, huh?"

"Come on, let's go out for dinner," says Bucky, rubbing their noses together. "Get me all acclimatised to this crazy newfangled world before I gotta meet your whole super-family."

They spend a gorgeous evening at a schwarma place down a back alley, picking food off each other's plates and laughing like kids. Steve falls asleep that night with Bucky draped over him like a heavy, sweaty blanket, and thinks that this is probably the happiest he's ever been.

* * *

Tony Stark has an amazing propensity to time his social arrangements for the worst possible moment, which is how Steve ends up somewhere in Vermont, staying in a hotel room that's bigger than several houses that he'd lived in as a child, at just the moment when he wants to be back in his own apartment, waiting for Bucky to visit again. He left a note on the table with a pile of more books he thought Bucky might like, and hoped he would still be around when he returns.

He needn't have worried, of course, because he's only been in the room for ten minutes when he sees the unmistakable shape of Bucky's shadow on the wall as he climbs in through the window.

"Tony assured me this place had great security," drawls Steve.

"It did," says Bucky flatly, crossing the room in a few strides and drawing Steve in for a kiss. He tastes like smoke, like the hand-rolled cigarettes he used to make, and for a moment Steve is intoxicated by the sheer fact of his presence.

"What are you doing here, Buck?"

"I hear you're attending a gala," murmurs Bucky into his skin, his lips pressed close to Steve's.

"I sure am, but I don't have a date yet."

"Pretty thing like you? Guess this is my lucky day," smirks Bucky with some of his old swagger.

"Don't suppose you've got a suit hidden under that sweater, do ya?"

"Nope," says Bucky, popping the 'p' obnoxiously and swinging an arm over Steve's shoulder, "but I know you always bring at least two, because you're incapable of making decisions."

"Whatever did I do without you?"

* * *

Captain America isn't exactly "out of the closet", as they say nowadays, but Steve's pretty sure that in the 21st century all this stuff is considered fine now. Still, as they walk into the ballroom arm in arm there is a moment of hushed silence before the conversations resume.

"Hey there, Robocop," says Tony, approaching warily from the side. "You scrub up pretty good. Much less murder-ey than your usual get-up. Say, you're not going to do any murders this evening, are you? It's just, we're supposed to be raising money to buy Christmas presents for needy children, and assassinations are not as festive as you'd think."

Instead of responding to Tony, Bucky turns to Steve. "Is he always like this?"

"Invariably," says Natasha icily, appearing from nowhere. She stands, hands on hips, surprisingly menacing for her small stature, and looks Bucky in the eye. "Listen, dude, I'm pretty fond of Steve, so if you murder him in his sleep, you and I are gonna have a problem."

"What if I murder him while he's awake?" 

Natasha shrugs. "He probably deserved it."

"Hey!" Steve makes his wounded face and Bucky pats him on the back consolingly.

"Has someone already given him the shovel talk?" asks Sam, walking up to them with a tray of canapes.

"This one," says Bucky, nodding towards Nat. "It was very convincing."

"OK, she's got it covered, that's good. I don't want any more of your cooking tips by the way, so please knock that the hell off."

"Stop making oatmeal-raisin cookies. Steve doesn't like oats," grunts Bucky in response. "Take some constructive criticism."

"_Stop breaking into my house and bitching about my cookies._"

"_Bake better cookies._"

The two men stand facing off against each other, eyes narrowed. Eventually, Sam gives up on the staring contest, and walks back to the buffet table mumbling ominously that they can bake their own goddamn cookies from now on.

Steve's trying really hard to be mad at Bucky for being rude to his friend, but he's mostly just elated that Bucky remembers what kind of food he likes.

"C'mon," says Bucky suddenly, tugging him towards the dance floor. "Let me see your moves."

"Buck," protests Steve weakly, allowing himself to be pulled along, "you know I can't dance."

"You don't gotta lead when you're dancing with me, remember?" says Bucky, looping his arms around Steve's waist. "It's easier that way."

Steve sighs, twining his hands behind Bucky's neck, stroking through his dark hair. "This is nice," he admits after a moment, gazing into the true blue of Bucky's eyes. "I can't believe I have you back," he whispers.

"Don't get weepy on me, Rogers," teases Bucky, nonetheless kissing away the tears that had started to form at the corner of Steve's eyes. "Big sissy."

"Yeah, but I'm _your_ sissy," says Steve, batting his eyelashes.

They move slowly to the music, in their own little world, a tiny bubble of contentment, all wrapped up in each other.

Then the universe, rudely, decides to interrupt.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For all that Steve appreciates a nice evening dressed to the nines and dancing with his best guy, he would much prefer not to have to deal with the flying asshole squid-monsters that have decided to crash the party.

For all that Steve appreciates a nice evening dressed to the nines and dancing with his best guy, he would much prefer not to have to deal with the flying asshole squid-monsters that have decided to crash the party.

"Why the hell are they so gooey?" shouts Sam, wielding a serving tray like a tennis racket and beating away the tiny cephalopods with a series of wet "thwap" sounds. Most of the guests had already stampeded downstairs into the basement, leaving the Avengers, Bucky, and a couple of intrepid serving staff to deal with the invasion.

"Cooked too slow," says Clint, nodding wisely. "I made calamari once. Or, I tried to." He breaks off, stamping on a squid.

"Jarvis, what are these things?" yells Tony, half dressed in his Iron Man suit and picking squids out of his tuxedo.

"Analysis inconclusive," says Jarvis' tinny voice. "However, there are a number of larger creatures assembling on the roof as we speak."

"Cap-" begins Tony, but Steve is already hurling himself through the fire exit and up the side of the building, Bucky in tow.

The squid-monster that greets them on the roof is even bigger, and even gooier.

"Can I help you?" says Steve in his best Captain America voice.

"This planet is ours," says the creature in squelchy tones. "You will be absorbed."

"Sorry," says Steve, aiming a punch at the squid's head, severing it and knocking it to the other side of the roof. "I'm taken."

With a whoop, Tony soars overhead in a streak of red and gold, and Steve only just has time to grab his shield as it falls from the sky before it hits him in the head. He turns to face the approaching army, raising his shield in front of him. Bucky is right behind him, wielding guns in both hands, which he must have pulled from... somewhere? inside his sleek, well-fitting suit.

They fall into sync without thinking, Steve lopping off the heads of the big squids with his shield and Bucky firing at the small, flying ones, felling them with extreme precision. The soft 'splat' sounds of cephalopod matter hitting the ground fills the air around them.

"Incoming!" yells Clint, poking his head above the parapet. Before Steve can react, Bucky's grabbing his shield and flinging it into the nose of the alien ship that's bearing down on them. It hits the fuselage with enough force to send the vessel off course, missing the building by inches and crashing into a nearby copse of trees instead. He catches the shield effortlessly in his metal hand and tackles Steve to the ground, just in time for a piece of debris to narrowly miss taking his head clean off.

More squid creatures are pouring out of the wreckage of the ship, swarming up the building in droves. In a flash, Tony reappears, hovering in mid-air over the hotel's roof, and his voice booms from the suit's speakers.

"I'm gonna try something," he calls out. "Everybody cover your ears."

A deafening wail, audible even through Steve's big hands over his ears, rends the air, the pitch climbing with each warble. The creatures pause and then begin to shake uncontrollably, before eventually collapsing into puddles of goo.

"I tapped into their resonant frequency," explains Tony, landing on the roof and letting his mask retract. "Kinda the opposite of putting corn starch paste on a bass speaker. I figured, they're kinda gooey already, why not just decrease the viscosity?"

"Thanks Tony," says Steve, clapping him on the shoulder. "That was disgusting."

"Ugh, Pepper's going to kill me for ruining that tuxedo," he groans. "Stupid non-Newtonian assholes. I'm gonna see if any of my robots can help with cleaning this up - I think I have a roomba somewhere. Do I have a roomba?" He taps at a console on his arm. "You two lovebirds go have a shower or something," he adds, looking up and winking entirely unnecessarily. "You've earned it."

"I would prefer not to be covered in this substance," agrees Bucky, leading the way down to their room, which remains blissfully free of goo.

"Your friends are exhausting," says Bucky, stripping off his sodden jacket.

Steve laughs. "I know."

"I'm glad I met them," Bucky replies quietly, cupping Steve's face with one hand. "They're good people."

"You're good people too, Buck," says Steve earnestly, taking Bucky's hand and kissing the palm. "Thanks for saving my ass."

After taking much-needed showers, they end up sitting out on their room's balcony under the stars, wrapped in one blanket. Tony's somehow rustled up an entire army of drones, which are busily firing water pistols at the building's facade to rinse off the debris. They watch the robots for a while, enjoying the way they duck and dive in harmony together.

"I want to go home, Steve," says Bucky quietly, burying his face into his neck. Steve's heart skips a beat at the idea of Bucky calling his apartment _home_.

"I got a ride here with Stark," he says reluctantly. "I don't know if his driver's still around. We might have to wait until morning."

"Why don't we take your bike?"

"I didn't bring my-"

Bucky points down to the car park where Steve' Harley is sitting across two parking spaces, gleaming in the light of the street lamps.

"I don't know why I even bother locking things," grumbles Steve as they make their way outside. "And you still park like an asshole."

"C'mon," laughs Bucky, swinging a leg over the body of the bike. "I'll have us back in record time."

Steve rolls his eyes and climbs on behind him, holding him tight around the waist and nestling his head into Bucky's shoulder. As they pull out onto the highway, he lets out a breath and closes his eyes.

"I'm glad to have you back," he says quietly, words barely audible above the roar of the bike. Bucky doesn't say anything, but Steve can tell that he's got that beautiful lop-sided smirk on his face as he revs the engine and speeds along down the road, ready to drive on through the night to get back to their home.


End file.
